Chapter 1239: Eliminated Humans
The three-person team expanded to four. As a "captured" member, Chen Chou bustled around Xu Huo's group, sometimes walking ahead to scout the path, sometimes turning back to offer water and food, showing no resentment at all.
This made Mu Yan and Li Cheng feel somewhat uncomfortable, as they had never encountered such a person before.
And his name was real.
He was really called Chou (Ugly), and he shared his life story without any hesitation. He said he was abandoned at birth because he was too ugly—though this was questionable since he only knew it from others' accounts. The family that adopted him named him Chou, aiming for realism.
Under normal circumstances, people would name children with auspicious meanings, or casually pick a trendy or common name. Whoever named Chen Chou carried some malice.
"Changing a name isn't hard, is it?" Li Cheng said. "You're a player. You could change it every day if you wanted."
Chen Chou grinned. "Even if I changed it to something fancy, people would still call me Ugly Guy. I can't be bothered with that."
"Are you from Zone 001?" Mu Yan studied him for a moment before asking. "Which city do you live in?"
Chen Chou's smile froze for an instant, but quickly returned to normal. "Fresh Flower City."
Mu Yan immediately fell silent.
"What's wrong with Fresh Flower City?" Xu Huo, who was leaning to the side drinking water, asked. Earlier, some players had identified Mu Yan as being from Fresh Flower City, saying that people from there carried a floral scent that was easy to recognize. But Chen Chou didn't have that scent.
"Although it's called Fresh Flower City, not every place is covered in flowers," Mu Yan said. "The city is huge. There are always areas the government can't manage."
"That's putting it politely," Li Cheng said. "In Zone 001, the places where the powerful and the ordinary people live are clearly divided. On the surface, it looks like unified management, but ordinary people cannot enter the directly administered districts outside of important festivals. Doing so is a crime—at minimum imprisonment, at worst death."
"Isn't Zone 001's legal system very complete?" Xu Huo put down his water bottle. "Do they have two different sets of laws for those who control social resources and ordinary people?"
"I heard there's a specific public security management law for the directly administered districts. It's not publicly announced. Ordinary citizens are simply told they cannot enter the directly administered districts. As for what crimes they might commit if they go in... just don't go in."
"But players can enter the directly administered districts."
Li Cheng curled his lips. "Like all other game zones, Zone 001 welcomes outside players to settle down. If you're a high-level player holding a Light Gentleman card, they'll rent or sell you a house at a low price."
"If you can live in the directly administered district, the treatment is excellent. Not only does the government check on you daily and give you food and medicine on schedule, they even prepare your clothes, shoes, and socks."
"But this clothing benefit isn't exclusive to the directly administered districts. Ordinary people get it too. Many medium and large cities distribute clothes to citizens on a regular schedule each year."
Of the three present, only Xu Huo seemed unfamiliar with Zone 001's situation. "So the residents of Card City wearing similar styles of clothes wasn't because of fashion trends."
"Fashion..." Li Cheng couldn't help but shake his head with a laugh. "During major festivals, citizens must wear government-designated clothes when going out, or they'll face penalties. While it won't lead to imprisonment, it will reduce their welfare benefits. Many ordinary people rely on government welfare to get by."
After technology advanced, many manual labor positions were replaced by machines. Even the repair of precision instruments could be handled by machines, let alone other light industries. Even intermediate steps no longer required human labor. Additionally, some artistic fields were also replaced by machines—writing, painting, music. Whatever humans could do, machines could do better.
So it wasn't that ordinary citizens didn't want to work; there was simply nothing for them to do.
After all, for Zone 001, which pursued perfection, there were always some flaws in human-created things.
"After researching Zone 001's data, I once felt that ordinary people's greatest contribution to this city was making it look lively." Li Cheng found it both absurd and understandable that under these circumstances, ordinary people being eliminated was normal. "The service industry workers we saw in Card City could have been completely replaced by machines. Zone 001 could easily provide every household with a guiding intelligent robot."
Mu Yan nodded silently.
This was Zone 001—seemingly lively, but in truth, cold.
"The government doesn't support these people for nothing," Chen Chou interjected. "Every year, a large number of players emerge from the ordinary people. Look, someone like me, abandoned by my parents as a child, can still grow up with food and clothing. That's much better than ordinary people in other zones."
Half of his words came from the heart.
Mu Yan glanced at him, her lips moving, but she said nothing more.
Xu Huo didn't know much about Zone 001's internal affairs, but from the attitudes of the two plus Li Cheng's explanation, the "carefree" ordinary people of Zone 001 probably weren't as well off as they seemed.
"This must be a city with severe internal competition," he remarked.
He ended the topic with this strange comment.
For the rest of the half-day, they finally found two players through the thick fog. They had only wanted to ask for directions, but the other party was extremely wary and attacked without a word, so they had to send the two on their way.
Mu Yan regained the Black Card 1.
This card had been taken by the white-faced player the previous night, but now it was back in their hands.
"Those two brothers are in deep trouble," Li Cheng said.
Not long after, Xu Huo opened a clue on the maze wall, indicating that someone had obtained six flower cards.
This clue wasn't new; it had appeared before. Given that the information on the maze wall was half-true and half-false, this might not be real.
Mu Yan knew Xu Huo had several flower cards, and Chen Chou also had one. Didn't that mean twelve flower cards were almost divided between two people?
"The information might not be real," Xu Huo said. But he knew in his heart that if Xue Lang's goal was also to get six flower cards to clear the instance, getting six cards wouldn't be difficult for him. The hard part would be matching the colors.
So he turned to ask Chen Chou what card he had.
Chen Chou had the White Pure Gold Boots. After being asked, he once again expressed that he had no attachment to the flower cards and would gladly exchange them with Xu Huo, but they would need to find an exchange card first.
Xu Huo currently had three flower cards—two black and one white. Including Chen Chou's, they barely had two of each color, but he still wanted to complete a full set.
If Xue Lang really had six cards, the chances were slim.
"Should we look for exchange cards?" Mu Yan asked. "Those two exchange cards from before have probably returned to the starting point and are now held by players. We could go back and intercept them."
There was no need to worry about finding the starting point, because later players would definitely come looking for them. And intercepting new players was more cost-effective—since they had fewer cards, there was no need to reshuffle randomly.